Roundup of distressing climate news

I’ve long wondered why the Obama administration threw climate-change negotiations under the bus at the United Nations Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen (COP15) in 2009. Evidence generally available at the time did not suggest near-term human extinction as a result of climate change. In fact, the scientific community had reported none of the following self-reinforcing feedback loops (i.e., positive feedbacks, the term that implies the opposite of its meaning):

Methane hydrates are bubbling out the Arctic Ocean (Science, March 2010)

Warm Atlantic water is defrosting the Arctic as it shoots through the Fram Strait (Science, January 2011)

Siberian methane vents have increased in size from less than a meter across in the summer of 2010 to about a kilometer across in 2011 (Tellus, February 2011)

Drought in the Amazon triggered the release of more carbon than the United States in 2010 (Science, February 2011)

Peat in the world’s boreal forests is decomposing at an astonishing rate (Nature Communications, November 2011)

Methane is being released from the Antarctic, too (Nature, August 2012)

Russian forest and bog fires are growing (NASA, August 2012)

Cracking of glaciers accelerates in the presence of increased carbon dioxide (Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, October 2012)

Arctic drilling was fast-tracked by the Obama administration during the summer of 2012

And the band plays on

As nearly as I can distinguish, only the latter feedback process is reversible. Once you pull the tab on the can of beer, there’s no keeping the carbon dioxide from bubbling up and out. Because we’ve entered the era of expensive oil, I can’t imagine we’ll voluntarily terminate the process of drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic (or anywhere else).

None of the major large-scale assessments included any major self-reinforcing feedback loops. To date, the following assessments have failed to include relevant feedbacks:

Fecklessness on display

Finally, after considerable reflection and the accumulation of evidence, the Obama administration’s rationale became apparent. The following two factors doubtless go a long way toward explaining why the civilized world gave up on its children:

1. As pointed out by the United Nations Advisory Group on Greenhouse Gases in 1990, “Beyond 1 degree C may elicit rapid, unpredictable and non-linear responses that could lead to extensive ecosystem damage.” In 2009, planetary instruments indicated Earth had warmed about 1 C since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

2. Much more importantly, however, are the results of a single briefing in Copenhagen. A footnote on that long-forgotten briefing contains this statement: “The long term sea level that corresponds to current CO2 concentrations is about 23 meters above today’s level, and the temperatures will be 6 degrees C or more higher. These estimates are based upon real long term climate records, not on models.”

Apparently, the Obama administration knew in 2009 what we all know today. The jig is up because of the feedbacks we’ve triggered.

Coal will nearly overtake oil as the dominant energy source by 2017 … without a major shift away from coal, average global temperatures could rise by 6 degrees Celsius by 2050, leading to devastating climate change.

And, too little, too late. Climate scientist Paul Beckwith indicates Earth could warm by 6 C within a decade at the 11:20 mark of this video.

Related

About Guy McPherson

Guy McPherson is professor emeritus of natural resources and the environment at the University of Arizona, where he taught and conducted research for 20 years. He's published more than 100 articles along with eleven books, including Walking Away From Empire and his most recent, Going Dark, published in October 2013. Guy has focused for many years on conservation of biological diversity and lives in an off-grid, straw-bale house where he practices durable living via organic gardening, raising small animals for eggs and milk, and working with members of his rural community. Learn more at guymcpherson.com or email Guy at grm@ag.arizona.edu.

Comments

So then what’s Obama thinking, if he knows all this? Geoengineering, or crowd control to avoid more suffering as the world dies? I was assuming he either didn’t believe or hadn’t heard enough about the runaway effects.

Let’s ignore the models for a moment and consider only the results of a single briefing to the United Nations Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen (COP15). Regulars in this space will recall COP15 as the climate-change meetings thrown under the bus by the Obama administration. A footnote on that long-forgotten briefing contains this statement: “THE LONG-TERM SEA LEVEL THAT CORRESPONDS TO CURRENT CO2 CONCENTRATION IS ABOUT 23 METERS ABOVE TODAY’S LEVELS, AND THE TEMPERATURES WILL BE 6 DEGREES C OR MORE HIGHER. THESE ESTIMATES ARE BASED ON REAL LONG TERM CLIMATE RECORDS, NOT ON MODELS.”

In other words, Obama and others in his administration knew near-term extinction of humans was already guaranteed. Even before the dire feedbacks were reported by the scientific community, the Obama administration abandoned climate change as a significant issue because it knew we were done as early as 2009. Rather than shoulder the unenviable task of truth-teller, Obama did as his imperial higher-ups demanded: He lied about collapse, and he lied about climate change. And he still does.

The article which you just posted, “Peak Oil solved, but climate will fry,” offers a prediction based on a contingency or scenario — whether or not we go ahead and burn up all of these high-hanging fossil fruits, with their very low EROEI. What I’m interested in is what’s in the “pipline” if humanity were to quickly and dramatically alter its course, abandoning fossil fuels.

Now, I realize that a dramatic and sudden abandonment of fossil fuels on a global scale is improbable. But it does not seem to me impossible. Humanity would have to address it as an emergcy in need of immediate and dramatic change. And that’s how I’m treating the situation, since I’m not yet convinced that the “pipeline” (as Hansen calls it) has already set the stage for what you call “near term human extinction”. I figure we have some small chance of changing that fate. And telling people otherwise seems to me … well, irresponsible.

You have entirely evaded my direct questoin in my previous post, regards the opinions and action /
engagement of folks like James Hansen and Bill McKibben. To be honest, I think you may be discouraging the action and engagment which we require if we are to avoid the worst case senarios.

I would like to see discussion and debate on this matter. For if our goose is not already cooked, those who insist that it is too late to prevent such cooking may be causing as much harm as the climate skeptics have done.

For what it is worth, I’ll tell where I’m coming from. I think humanity should swiftly abandon the fossil fuel economy, which would necessarily mean giving up industrial civilization. But I am not a primitivist, exactly. I think we should throw much overboard, but keep things like bicycles and sheet glass. We’ll need sheet glass so we can have passive solar dwellings. Some fragments of the industrial world should be kept. But most of it should be abandoned, e.g. cars, big box stores, plastic shit from China, the whole overproductive, overconsuptive madhouse…. But shovels and hoes for our gardens? Sure!

Hansen and McKibben were among the co-founders of 350.org. Simply by using the phrase 350.org they are ignorant or disingenuous. I suspect it’s the latter. After all, they surely know what I know, if they read the literature about climate change:

1. More than three years ago, Tim Garrett pointed out in the journal Climatic Change that only complete economic collapse prevents runaway greenhouse. Even then, according to the AOSIS Briefing linked and discussed here, it was too late to prevent near-term extinction.

2. At about the same time, Solomon et al. found, in a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, that today’s level of atmospheric carbon dioxide is the minimum we’ll experience for at least the next thousand years.

Calling me irresponsible for speaking and writing the truth is the response I’ve come to expect from people deep in denial about our climate-change situation. Some prescient words from George Orwell come to mind: “Truth is treason in an empire of lies.”

The world of politics and media is driven by consumerism (advertising and demand for goods). The media will cover whatever sells cars on the 6:00 news. The politicians will talk about the things their corporate donors pay them to talk about with campaign contributions and back scratching deals in the bloated income tax code.
The discussion will become serious when the people stop buying the stuff in the advertisements. Not one moment before. The politicians are not going to tell us to stop driving cars and to grow our own food. The banks are not going to tell us to stop using dollars (each of which only has value according to how much oil is pumped out of the ground to move the economy), and the colleges are not going to tell us to stop sending our kids as fodder into the System of systems which pays their academicians’ salaries.
The hologram will continue until it cannot be maintained. Climate change is just noise outside the hologram of our existence: until it’s not.
We all want the discussion to happen, but how many of us are going to do these things:
1. Stop using money to live.
2. Stop driving.
3. Stop associating with people who are still part of the system.
4. Stop doing things that do not add more resources to the future than they consume.
5. Stop living where one needs fossil fuels to exist as a citizen (see #1).
As a refresher for those who don’t think about it: Banks do not create money by ‘loaning it into existence’. They get their borrowers to promise to take resources from their own futures in order to pay interest and principal for something they would otherwise simply live without (banks do not loan money if you need it for living: only for things you DON’T need).

Simply add up all debts (public and private-that you can find out about), then calculate how many resources will have to be burned up to pay those debts off.
Then try to imagine how that economic model fits any kind of reduction of fossil fuel use in the foreseeable future.

The co-founders of 350.org, including James Hansen and Bill McKibben, are ignorant or disingenous with the very name of the organization. I’m guessing they’re lying because surely they know about these two tidbits:

2. About the same time, a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciencesindicated Earth’s atmosphere will not experience carbon dioxide levels below the current level for at least the next thousand years. In other words, 350 ppm is hopium of the worst kind.

We’re done, and even the Obama administration knew it way back in 2009. The AOSIS briefing linked and described here was clear about 350 ppm as a death sentence.

Calling me irresponsible for reporting relevant information is exactly the response I’ve come to expect from people who are neck-deep in denial. Such comments remind me of a prescient line from George Orwell: “Truth is treason in an empire of lies.”

Instead of turning away from data and models, I take my advice from Carl Sagan. As such, I refuse to dilute the truth for the sake of comfort: “It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.”

“Calling me irresponsible for reporting relevant information is exactly the response I’ve come to expect from people who are neck-deep in denial. Such comments remind me of a prescient line from George Orwell: ‘Truth is treason in an empire of lies.’

It would be relevant information if you could produce an explanation for why the world’s climatologists don’t echo your claim. As it is, if I google “near term extinction” with “global warming” or “climate change” I find your postings of doom … and no credible scientists echoing your views.

I’m calling your efforts irresponsible because the effect of such efforts can only be damage to the cause you once served. Lots of good people are putting a lot of their time and money and effort … sweat and tears … into preventing the cooking of this goose. You’re basically saying that they are deluded, dishonest and “neck-deep in denial”.

Our goose may be in serious danger, all right. But it ain’t cooked until the Fat Lady sings.

I cannot account for the inability of others to tell the truth beyond Upton Sinclair’s classic line: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” As for me, I’ll keep spreading timely, accurate information.

Regardless how dire the situation, I have never suggested giving up the fight against imperialism. I have led the way, and have never backed off my pursuit of a path beyond the morally bankrupt industrial economy.

Were they online and interested in your opinion, I suspect Paul Beckwith and Malcolm Light would be offended. You’ve concluded they are not credible scientists. Ditto for the large group of Light’s colleagues at the Arctic Methane Emergency Group.

Or maybe your ability to find relevant information online is the primary limitation.

“You’ve concluded they are not credible scientists.” No, I don’t think I have. I’ve concluded only that you’re the only voice I know of saying that there’s no salvaging of our situation, that our goose is cooked, or — in a mix of praphrase and direct quotation –, we’re on an unalterable coarse toward “near term human extinction”. If you will provide direct quotes from relevant and credible scientists who publically agree with you, I’m all ears.

The Climate Methane Emergency Group has the telling word in their name: “emergency” — which implies that there are possible ameliorative responses, as they see it. I’m in full agreement with them that our sitionation is an emergency. I got that on a “gut” level when I learned very recently that many scientists are expecting an ice-free arctic summer in the near future. (Before then, I was doing eco-social work and research which didn’t strongly emphasize current climate science. Now I’m devoting almost all of my time to trying to treat the climate situation as an emergency while catching up–slowly–on the current science.)

I mean you no personal disrespect in saying your words are, in places, “irresponsible”. In fact, I deeply admire you as a person. You’ve done a lot of very important work and accomplished a lot of forward momentum (though you may not think so). I especially admire you for your walking of your talk and dropping out of the empire / fossil economy. I’m devoting myself to helping as many people to do the same as possible. (A crucial part of my current efforts is to attempt to build a social/political movement challenging existing land use regulations and building codes, thus enabling and encouraging ecovillage type projects.)

Arctic Methane Emergency Group says:

“What to do — There are several ways to tackle the problem if action is not delayed: they may be grouped together as geo-engineering solutions. However, they do require rapid mobilisation on national and international scales: first, to verify the science, and second, to implement the necessary counter-measures. There is an almost impossible challenge to implement the counter-measures quickly enough to prevent the possible collapse of the Arctic sea ice in summer 2013, but this challenge has to be faced as an international emergency.”

Geo-engeneering is a rather frightening prospect to me. I know little about it, but do worry about possible unintended consequences. If we’ve learned anything so far from the long history of human blunders…. But I’m willing to do whatever is necessary to preserve the biosphere, and humanity. I am no misanthrope. I just see us as needing to grow the heck up.

I do not see how you can recognize the ecological predicament of mankind and not be a misanthrope. I mean, how do you think we got to this point of seven billion people over running their resource base and threatening much of the rest of life on earth if not by being the most ambitious, greedy and violent species to yet evolve? What I mean to say is you don’t have to hate people, but you do have to recognize them as the fatally flawed and extremely dangerous species that they are in order to be in touch with reality.

Now, I realize that a dramatic and sudden abandonment of fossil fuels on a global scale is improbable. But it does not seem to me impossible.

Without the will, it is indeed impossible. Personally, I see no will. I cannot discuss this matter other than online; any attempts to engage family, friends, work colleagues in discussion of the concept of actually doing something about the problems are met with shrugged shoulders (at best) or expressions of incredulity. I get the distinct impression that people simply don’t want to know; they want to be left to be happy in their delusion that ‘normality’ will continue.

Our “last, best chance” for moving forward was Copenhagen in 2009. If you want another stab at a ‘last chance’ then I suggest joining the ForwardOnClimate rally in Washington DC on 17Feb2013. If, and only if, there is a truly massive response, such as hundreds of thousands of folk actually turning up to demonstrate — a response that the mass media won’t be able to ignore — then maybe, just maybe, something will actually begin to happen. But even then, I wouldn’t bet on it.

“I cannot discuss this matter other than online; any attempts to engage family, friends, work colleagues in discussion of the concept of actually doing something about the problems are met with shrugged shoulders (at best) or expressions of incredulity. I get the distinct impression that people simply don’t want to know; they want to be left to be happy in their delusion that ‘normality’ will continue.”

Yes! Isn’t it amazing and strange?! The overwhelming majority of folks around me, as well, are either in denial of the severe nature of the crisis / emergency or they have already thrown in the towell, saying “Yeah, it’s really f***ing bad, but there’s nothing we can do about it.” One of these days I might have to draw up a taxonomy of responses (and non-responses) I’ve heard over the years. It might actually prove useful. Perhaps a number of us could draw up our respective taxonomy and compare notes–possibly leading to a map, of sorts. A map of a knot in human cognition.

So where am I on this map? I am clearly among the rarer of sub-species. I acknowledge there to be a state of global emergency which *could* result in “near term extinction” for humans (which would mean wiping out most of the biosphere). AND I’m devoting almost all of my life (and time) to trying to avoid this worst case scenario.

How? You may ask. Well, my diagnosis and treatment protocol goes like this.:

The capitalist-industrial system/economy runs on fossil fuels. There’s no way we could switch to anything other than fossil fuels (renewables, nuclear…) and sustain this system on such a meager net energy budget. We’re already heading down the peak net energy slope [Richard Heinberg]. The present economy could not be sustained even if we wanted to — and we should not want to because sustaining it would extinguish most of the life on this planet. Diagnosis? Addiction to deadly poison.

Treatment protocol? The capitalist-industrial system must be scaled back to such a size that it can be drowned in a bath tub. But how? It begins with 1% of us refusing the fossil economy. Immediately, as if our lives depended upon it. This one percent knows the hell of the addiction, has hit bottom, and is ready to give it up — regardless of what others are doing. We’re not using the excuse: “But not enough people will make this change!” So freaking what! There’s no time to play at make-believe. And pointing our fingers at others is a subtle form of avoidance, a sick joke we play on ourselves to avoid the WORK of kicking the habit.

This 1% DEMONSTRATES to some small minority of people (say, 2-3%) that it is possible to quit the drug and still have a good and happy life. It’s not theoretical. Its not hypothetical. Its not unimaginable. Its in their faces, real, practical, observable.

Some small fraction of these people decide to live in this other way. They join with the others and keep the snow ball rolling, picking up snow along the way. Eventually, the !% becomes 5%. It has become a movement. Stuff is getting done — and they’re / we’re doing it without asking the government’s permission. Meanwhile, we’re also investing *some* of our energy into actions meant to affect the government. We’re not refusing politics. We’re sidestepping it when it comes to asking permission. We do not ask the government if it is okay with them for us to have basic shelter and food and such simple basic needs met without fosil inputs–or radically reduced fossil inputs. If necessary, we appropriate land. We handcuff ourselves to trees if necessary. We do what needs doing. We’re on the moral high ground. It’s a movement, remember! We don’t go to the back of the bus. We sit down at the lunch counter. We order sandwitches. We get hit with fire hoses, dogs….

This revolution will not be televised. It will be on the internet. It will grow rapidly. For there will be an observable alternative to the Death Culture. Not everyone can imagine such an alternative. It must be demonstrated. It is a movement, remember! Demonstrations are what we do in this movement. It’s not unlike quitting alcohol or tobacco or heroin. It’s done in public, visibly. We share our stories about quitting on the internet. We do what we can. We grow our numbers. We do what we must. But we do not sitl idle. We blame no one.

The best example of people doing it is the ecovillage movement. Take Dancing Rabid as an example. They’re doing it. Lots of folks are doing it. All over the world. But we’re not doing it in the numbers that really matter — yet.

Think of the ecovillage movement as a spear head, as the front line. It’s probably easier to live such a way in a rural community. But there are urban and even suburban ecovillage projects.

Hi Guy,
What to say with such a gloomy scenario? I thank you for speaking the truth, however unpalatable for a lot of folks. I’m no climate scientist but have been a very active environmental campaigner for around 25 years. Your analysis has been sitting uncomfortably in my gut for about 15 years now. I coordinate a number of sustainability and climate change campaigns here in Scotland but your analysis makes me wonder why I bother. Optimistic in action, pessimistic in thought I suppose. I’ve shared your videos but who wants to know that they are likely to die soon and our planet will be changed irreversibly. There will be no mass action to tackle these problems and economic growth will go on until the end. I don’t think politicians have been lying on purpose though. I think they have a subconscious/psychological block here. As I am climate change campaigner do you have any advice for me regarding what path I should take?

I have thought for sometime now that the only hope for humanity is for a severe a near term economic collapse. I still hold out hope; I predict oil will hit $150 a barrel this summer. I hope the high prices can generate some failures in the banking system triggering the $700 trillion in derivatives just waiting for a match. The global financial system is hanging by a thread and whether or not our goose is cooked or not it would be nice to watch the death machine (industrial civilization) explode.
Thanks for your efforts.

I have thought for sometime now that the only hope for humanity is for a severe near term economic collapse. I still hold out hope; I predict oil will hit $150 a barrel this summer. I hope the high prices can generate some failures in the banking system triggering the $700 trillion in derivatives just waiting for a match. The global financial system is hanging by a thread and whether or not our goose is cooked or not it would be nice to watch the death machine (industrial civilization) explode.
Thanks for your efforts.

Thanks for the hard work, Guy. I wish I had your energy and ambition.
Here’s another example for people to consider:
The F-35 aircraft is priced around 235 million dollars (each, including GFE:government furnished equipment).
In order to pay for that with a 25% tax rate, someone in the country has to perform 1 billion dollars of taxable income. Let’s pick “Joe the Plumber” who works for someone else. That company probably makes some kind of profit on his work, (let’s round it to 50%…based on a 100% markup on materials and a guess that they are paying him with the profits from the materials). That puts us at 1-1/2 billion dollars of economic activity so that Joe can be taxed enough to pay for one jet (plus interest on the debt). The Navy needs about 30 per aircraft carrier, in a 12-carrier fleet of “power projection.”
All because people believe the bullsh_t story that their “Raspberry Fields” subdivision is going to be attacked by Tare-Ists if we don’t keep buying fossil-fueled jets to protect our ability to take fossil fuels from deep in the ground and drive to the mall to buy new clothes to drive to the job interview to pay for the car to drive to the mall.
The Empire just doesn’t scale well if you actually look at the numbers. Only a fraction of it gets paid for. The rest is the magic of investor hallucinations and virtual printing presses coupled with the time-traveling to the future to steal our grandchildren’s lives.

My sense is that Bill McKibben and others who continue to fight in whatever way they can do so simply because they can’t live with themselves if they don’t. They know exactly what the likely outcome is. In fact, I’ve heard Bill allude to it in interviews, but not come out and say it. He’ll say, of a 4 degree C rise, “and that would be an outcome nobody wants.” I don’t think he wants to trumpet the worst outcome in a general interview because people who don’t know much about it might either discount him or give up right away. I asked him a question on a phone-in show about the “earth too hot to support life” scenario and he did not deny it. He just said “we will not turn into Venus”…and that civilization as we know it would end with such an increase.

He and I both hope that something unexpected will happen. But if it doesn’t, we’ll keep fighting, because it’s the good fight. He said as much as the Climate Rally in February. Which I went to.

Most of society does not want to believe what will be happening in the next 20 years. Its easier to feel good, pray and hope. Let’s watch our sports and entertainment on TV and feel good. Maybe watch 30 minutes of the mainsteam soft news then consider ourselves educated. McKibben and 350.org. is an insult to my intelligence. That train left the station when 350ppm was exceeded in the late 1980’s. We are hitting 400ppm and rising 3ppm annually. No humans were around 3 million plus years ago when co2 levels were that high. There were no permanent icecaps at the poles etc. The science is all you need to know. I do believe the top government officials know what our fate will be. Their actions are clear. Let’s step up drilling, fracking, lower our labor costs and maximize our profits and as long as we can. Once the arctic is ice free in a few years we will exploit those resources as well.

We missed the clean renewable train of solar in the 70’s. Big oil made that decision for us all. Corporations run the government like they have never before and the future will be very bleak at best. as the few at the top will continue to profit off the distruction of the earth and the eventual distruction of us all.